he vicomte as he turned westward, and then went
into the house, remarking, "_Qu'il est beau_"--"What a handsome fellow!"

De Courval passed on. Independence Hall interested him for a moment.
Many people went by him, going to their work, although it was early. He
saw the wretched paving, the few houses high on banks of earth beyond
Sixth Street, and then, as he walked westward on Chestnut Street,
pastures, cows, country, and the fine forest to the north known as the
Governor's Wood. At last, a mile farther, he came upon the bank of a
river flowing slowly by. What it was he did not know. On the farther
shore were farms and all about him a thinner forest. It was as yet
early, and, glad of the lonely freshness, he stood still a little while
among the trees, saw bees go by on early business bent, and heard in the
edge of the wood the love song of a master singer, the cat-bird. Nature
had taken him in hand. He was already happier when, with shock of joy he
realized what she offered. No one was in sight. He undressed in the edge
of the wood and stood a while in the open on the graveled strand, the
tide at full of flood. The morning breeze stirred lightly the pale-green
leaves of spring with shy caress, so that little flashes of warm light
from the level sun-shafts coming through the thin leafage of May flecked
his white skin. He looked up, threw out his arms with the naked man's
instinctive happiness in the moment's sense of freedom from all form of
bondage, ran down the beach, and with a shout of pure barbarian delight
plunged into the river. For an hour he was only a young animal alone
with nature--diving, swimming, splashing the water, singing bits of
love-songs or laughing in pure childlike enjoyment of the use of easy
strength. At last he turned on his back and floated luxuriously. He
pushed back his curly hair, swept the water from his eyes, and saw with
a cry of pleasure that which is seen only from the level of the watery
plain. On the far shore, a red gravel bank, taking the sun, was
reflected a plain of gold on the river's breadth. The quickened wind
rolled the water into little concave mirrors which, dancing on the gold
surface, gathered the clear azure above him in cups of intense indigo
blue. It was new and freshly wonderful. What a sweet world! How good to
be alive!

When ashore he stood in a flood of sunshine, wringing the water from
body and limbs and hair, and at last running up and down the beach until
he wa